I do not own Portal.
Hi everyone. Sorry for being late but university has started again so I am now quite busy. Updates will be a lot slower and I apologise for that but I do want to pass my university subjects well.
I doubt this chapter was worth the wait considering its just test chambers but, at least, there's some GLaDOS and Chell interaction. Sorry if this chapter is dull. It's actually real hard to describe test chambers and make them interesting.
~o0o~
Chapter 2 -The Cold Boot
TEST 1 –01/22
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
The remaining screens around the elevator that were somehow still alive showed the high-energy pellet receptacle. However, instead of the fuzzy balls of melt-inducing energy, there was a steady beam of red light emitting from the device. Chell groaned inwardly, her traitorous mind conjuring up numerous fantasies of her burning from a laser. Chell was pulled from her thoughts when she tripped over rubble.
"Sorry about the mess," GLaDOS responded. "I've really let this place go since you killed me. By the way, thanks for that."
The announcer from the previous tests added, "Sarcasm Self-Test complete."
"Oh good, that's back online. I'll start getting everything else working while you perform this first simple test. This involves deadly lasers and how test subjects react when locked in a room with deadly lasers."
Chell was tempted to harp back, "Annoyed," but knew that wasn't going to get her anywhere. So the woman approached the test chamber with confidence, recognising it as an adapted test chamber 6. Just like last time, Chell was required to use portals to send the activation energy from one receptacle to the other. This time, Chell just had to take a further step back in order to avoid frying the hair off her face when the laser beam was sent through. Drawing closer to the beam felt like nearing a fire.
A raising platform responded and moved up to the exit. Chell deflated at her time-consuming mistake. She moved the orange portal elsewhere, bringing the platform down so she could stand on it, and then fixed up the beam's road again so she was brought to the exit. Simple, just as the psychotic A.I. had said.
"Not bad. I forgot how good you are at this. You should pace yourself though. We have A LOT of tests to do."
~o0o~
TEST CHAMBER 2 –02/22
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
DISCOURAGEMENT REDIRECTION CUBE PRESENT
"This next test involves Discouragement Redirection Cubes. I'd just finished building them when you had your, well, episode," GLaDOS informed."So now we'll both get to see how they work."
Chell hoped they weren't something that could kill her. She was relying on the 'redirection' definition of the cube's title.
"There should be one in the corner."
The chamber was two floors. Naturally, the exit was on the unreachable second floor. A laser beam crossed the test chamber, forcing Chell to leap over it like a jumping horse to reach the other side. A receptacle was also present which meant that it was important. Something clicked inside Chell when she thought back to the new cube's name…'redirection.' She smirked at the beam. Chell spotted the corner that GLaDOS was talking about, used a portal to sneak past the blocking wreckage and picked up the Discouragement Redirection Cube.
When Chell glanced up briefly and back down again, her heart froze for a split second. Darting her eyes back to the wall where she swore she saw Wheatley, Chell's mood dropped when she saw nothing. The woman prayed she wasn't going to crazy already.
The Discouragement Redirection Cube was the exact same size as the Weighted Storage Cube but it weighed slightly less. It was plain white with grey edges. Beside its top and bottom, each of its size had a large round piece of glass in the centre. Chell could see the chamber looking through the lens. She noticed two of the four lens were curved which the woman guessed the beam would shoot out of when used.
Ah yes, about that. Chell jumped over the laser beam, the Redirection Cube held by her portal gun. Carefully, she brought the cube closer to the beam. It phased through the lens and came out the other curved end, angled elsewhere. Chell grinned and repositioned the cube to angle the beam towards the receptacle. She formed a right-angle with the cube. The beam activated stairs that lifted up to the exit.
She groaned when a Heavy Duty Super-Colliding Super Button that opened the exit door was without a cube. Luckily, the Redirection Cube was on portal-usable ground so Chell transported the cube to her easily, deactivating the stairs. Soon, Chell was waiting in the elevator.
"Well done," GLaDOS chimed in. "Here come the test results: you are a horrible person. I'm serious, that's what it says: a horrible person. We weren't even testing for that."
~o0o~
TEST CHAMBER 3 –03/22
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
DISCOURAGEMENT REDIRECTION CUBE PRESENT
Food was on Chell's mind when she clambered up the creaky stairs towards the chamber. It was quickly killed off when GLaDOS brought up a past conversation.
"Don't let that 'horrible person' thing discourage you. It's just a data point. If it makes you feel any better science has now validated your birth mother's decision to abandon you on a doorstep."
Grinding her teeth, Chell ceased her movement. Her mind was in turmoil over GLaDOS' words. If only the psychotic robot was not a psychotic robot but rather, a friendly robot that told the truth and wanted to help her. Chell had no idea whether GLaDOS' information on her so-called mother and apparent abandonment was true, but she hoped the psychotic robot was just mocking her.
But just because Chell had no recollection of her life, doesn't mean GLaDOS is unaware.
Inside the main test chamber Chell's feet were unable to find flat ground. She was constantly climbing and slipping up and down clumps of garbage. Along the way, GLaDOS was attending to the mess. Chell explored the chamber and found a particular…something. There was an opening in the wall. The woman doubted GLaDOS would lead her to a chamber with access to an escape but Chell crept down the ditch anyway. Inside, Chell saw more crazy drawings. One image was that of a mouth with the words Vilify spelt out on its teeth. Speech bubbles spewed from the mouth and human arms cascaded from the bottom lip towards a sea of black rings. Below, white text said: Feels Like A Trial. And then, the main message on the piece said, Don't Even Try.
Chell's stomach squirmed. What did that even mean? Don't try escaping? Don't try listening? What was she meant to do? Chell turned away from the work and gazed upon the other. Perhaps something a bit more cheerful would greet her. TOO MANY VARIABLES! SUCKER'S LUCK. EXILE! It truly felt like, at that moment, the artist had suddenly turned on her, shouting at her and her failure. But this caused a mixture of shame and fury to froth inside the woman. Sure, she had failed the first time but that wasn't her fault.
And it didn't mean that Chell was going to fail Escape Plan Part 2.
…But what if she did?
Upon the upper section Chell saw the Redirection Cube. She transported up there using her trusty portal gun. Upon doing so, the woman witnessed two laser beams activate. One was at a safe height –not too low or high, while the other was closer to the roof. Neither of the beams was pointing in the direction of their receptacles so Chell was doing a repeat of the last chamber, just a harder version. How wonderful.
GLaDOS shifted a platform from the ground high up and close to the middle safe beam. Chell was able to pick up the lens-covered cube and leap onto the platform, keeping as far away from the laser beam as possible. Suddenly that 'safe' beam got a whole lot more dangerous. What was Chell thinking actually describing it safe? That would be like calling GLaDOS friendly.
Once again, Chell used the cube to redirect the first beam to the receptacle at a nice 90 degree angle. Chell jumped back to the original location of the cube and found the second receptacle for the second top beam on the ceiling. Chell placed a portal where the second beam was nailing into the wall and then an orange on the floor to have the beam move straight to where it belonged. Chell smirked, watching everything that needed to be activated, get activated. Her boots absorbed the impact when she landed on the ground and moved pass the opened exit.
"Congratulations," GLaDOS said. Chell frowned at that. How unlike the A.I. – "Not on the test. Most people emerge from the suspension terribly undernourished. I want to congratulate you on beating the odds and somehow managing to pack on a few pounds." Ah, there she was.
Chell truthfully found the insult lacking. What, was she really meant to be offended by weight of all things?
~o0o~
TEST CHAMBER 4 –04/22
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
VITAL APPARATUS VENT PRESENT
MIND THE APERTURE SCIENCE WEIGHTED STORAGE CUBE
MIND THE HAZARD LIQUID –INSTANT DEATH
DO NOT DRINK TEST CHAMBER LIQUID
It was a lot cleaner on this floor although that didn't mean much. Chell kicked at the floor, noticing the newest image on the remaining screens. A white stick figure on a blue background waving at her but it froze mid-wave before fuzzing up and dying completely. Why did that somehow feel like a parallel to Chell's luck?
"One moment," GLaDOS said. Chell scoffed silently and proceeded anyway. The woman's attempt at rebellion soon appeared pitiful when Chell understood why she was stopped. At the top of the stairs the entire entrance to the test chamber was blocked off by wreckage. As GLaDOS cleared it away the A.I. remarked, "You're navigating these test chambers faster than I can build them. So feel free to slow down and…do whatever it is you do when you're not destroying this facility."
Chell only just bit back a snarky comment.
Test chamber 4 was dark and cold and looked like an abandoned swimming pool. Or, rather, the water had been drained and replaced with hazardous goo. Chell was standing on a balcony with portal-usable walls to her left. Across her, on a wall, was a Thermal Discouragement Beam. Its receptacle was, once again, in a test-fulfilling position. Bringing the beam to its home was simple enough but then Chell saw the scaffold move from the exit to an annex across her so that certainly dampened the woman's mood. She used her portals to get to the other side and then made the path for the beam again. There was a switch that sent through a Storage Cube. Chell picked it up and had another dampening moment when her fingers slipped, dropping the cube into the hazardous goo. She prayed the A.I. wouldn't make a comment.
With a new cube attached to the portal gun (since Chell apparently couldn't even trust her own fingers) she made it to the exit. Granted, she had to use the cube to protect her from the beam, proving the cubes were stronger than originally thought, but other than that, it was all good. "I'll give you credit. I guess you are listening to me," GLaDOS said as Chell placed the cube on the super-button. "But for the record, you don't have to go that slow."
~o0o~
TEST CHAMBER 5 –05/22
VITAL APPARATUS VENT PRESENT
MIND THE APERTURE SCIENCE WEIGHTED STORAGE CUBE
AERIAL FAITH PLATE PRESENT
MIND THE HAZARD LIQUID –INSTANT DEATH
DO NOT DRINK TEST CHAMBER LIQUID
As GLaDOS cleaned up a pile of Storage Cubes like the dutiful servant she was (Chell could only hope) Chell took note of the warnings on the test chamber sign. The 'aerial faith plate' picture depicted a stick figure being pushed up by some sort of catapult. Chell wondered whether she should even bother hoping for some luck anymore. This catapult looked just awful. Test chamber 5 was similar to the number 4, except bigger. Amongst the pool of goo there was a little island that was fashioned with an Aerial Faith Plate. Perfect. Chell saw her opening island had one too. The exit was up ahead.
"This next test involves the Aperture Science Aerial Faith Plate," Chell saw that her feet were planted on a blue target painted on the floor, just a metre away from the Plate."It was part of an initiative to investigate how well test subjects could solve problems when they were catapulted into space. Results were highly informative. They could not. Good luck!"
Well shit. Chell grumbled as a layer of black material skimmed off the walls and splashed loudly in the goo, dissolving in a matter of seconds. So, if the woman stuffed up the catapult she would get a nice bird's eye view of her death bed before landing. How wonderful. When Chell stood on tip-toe she was able to see that Exit Island had its own catapult, and a blue target. There was also a switch. An apparatus vent was stationed high up above the lone middle island's catapult.
Gulping at what she was about to do, Chell steadied her feet over the catapult. Just as the boot grazed the catapult a ripple of blue light flashed between the Plate and the bottom of Chell's white boot. A force was built from that ripple in a single second, launching the woman high up into the air. Immediately, the woman's body reacted the way anyone's would: flailing in panic. Despite the weak appearance of the Aerial Faith Plate, the science of the facility caused a reaction between the Plate and the boot that propelled the woman all the way to Exit Island, right on the target. Chell gasped upon landing, multiple swear words dispelling from her mouth.
She hated this.
When Chell finally gathered her wits she pressed the switch and brought down a Storage Cube. It hit the Aerial Faith Plate on the middle island and was pushed up…then it fell down…then pushed up… then down it went again. Chell did not want to do it again but goddammit she had to. Chell waited for the right moment to launch from the Aerial Faith Plate to propel past, grab the Storage Cube on the way, and land back at the beginning. She made it to the exit soon enough.
The last thing Chell needed, as she marched her down to the elevator, was an interesting fact. But… "Here's an interesting fact: you're not breathing real air. It's too expensive to pump this far down. We just take carbon dioxide out of the room, freshen it up a little, then pump it back in. So you'll be breathing the same room of air for the rest of your life. I thought that was interesting."
~o0o~
TEST 6 –06/22
VITAL APPARATUS VENT PRESENT
MIND THE APERTURE SCIENCE STORAGE CUBE
AERIAL FAITH PLATE PRESENT
MIND THE HAZARD LIQUID –INSTANT DEATH
DO NOT DRINK TEST CHAMBER LIQUID
Blowing irritating bits of hair out from her mouth, Chell leaned against the inner walls of the elevator as it streamed through the science facility. She tapped the Device to her knee, wincing when it hit too hard, and waited for the elevator to arrive at the next test chamber. On the woman's mind was the artist and the messages he left behind. Now Chell found herself doubting her abilities. What was she to do if she failed? She couldn't keep testing forever. Hell, what could Chell even define as 'forever'? Till she died from the science of the facility or by old age? Neither sounded good and– hang on.
Chell realised suddenly what was wrong with her: she was depressed. Depressed! Of all things! She was acting all sad and miserable and sulky. Could you blame her, considering what had happened? But, Chell considered, this was exactly what GLaDOS wanted. Chell straightened her back, dashed away any sad thoughts, and approached the set of stairs. There was no way this robot was going to cause such a reaction –
"Let's see what the next test is. Oh. Advanced Aerial Faith Plates," said GLaDOS.
–Crap. Chell sat herself down on the ground. She just needed a minute. That depression thing was back. She hated those plates so damn–
"Well, have fun soaring through the air without a care in the world."
–If Chell ever got the chance to physically hold GLaDOS in her hands, by god, was she going to exploit the hell out of–
"I have to go to the wing that was made entirely out of glass and pick up fifteen acres of broken glass. By myself."
Chell didn't know how but GLaDOS seemed to have this uncanny ability of always interrupting her inner thoughts at the worst of times. What a depressing situation to be in.
At first glance of the large test chamber, Chell just wanted to curl up and die. At least if she did it, then it would be death by own hands rather than death by GLaDOS. The feeling was even more tempting when bits of the ceiling came crashing down into the bubbling goo. Particular islands equipped with their own Advanced Aerial Faith Plates were dotted here and there is a logical line that, with proper care, would spring an individual from one side of the chamber to the other without dissolving their bodies. Chell even noticed two spots to apply portals so that momentum would not be broken.
And off she went.
The swear words spewing from Chell's mouth as she soared through the air became so colourful they switched languages to Italian. Well that was one way for Chell to learn another factor about herself. Despite not being Italian, she somehow knew the language. Or, at least, a nice supply of swear swords. With Chell at the other end, right near the closed exit, the woman pressed a switch to send an Aperture Science Weighted Storage Cube down the same path she just experienced. Except a cube wasn't the only thing granted wings.
"Oh, sorry, I'm still cleaning out the test chambers," GLaDOS said as Chell watched various objects zoom around the place. "So sometimes there's still trash in them. Standing around. Smelling and being useless. Try to avoid the garbage hurtling straight towards you."
Picking up the 'subtle' garbage insult, Chell altered the portals at the last moment so that the garbage was sent into another direction, straight into the office windows so that yes, she did avoid the garbage, thank you very much. The garbage successfully smashed through. Satisfaction warmed Chell's heart like a toasty fireplace but curiosity stoked the fire. She figured that a bit of exploration wouldn't go astray. So, placing GLaDOS and the test chamber at the back of her mind, Chell used her portals to get back to the start, reapplied the portals then soared into the violated workplace.
At what she saw Chell almost turned on her heels and left: another den.
The mysterious artist had taken refuge in the office, as evident in the empty cans of food and cartons of water. Unlike last time, when Chell first discovered the artist's dens, the leftovers inside the cans were dry and crumbling, signifying the crippling age of the office's visit. Oddly, there were two bright spheres, the size of Chell's head, rolled into a corner. Chell seized a familiar semi-circular radio. The same old music pumped through the speakers.
"You don't have to test with the garbage," GLaDOS told slowly, as though speaking to a young naïve child. "It's garbage. Press the button again."
GLaDOS' words barely registered with Chell distracted by the artwork colouring this den. It consisted of innocent cubes, reaching arms, and other science-y stuff etched on top of a splash of aqua blue paint. Reading the scratchy words Chell figured the artwork was titled, Smooth Jazz. Though Chell could hardly tell how the painted stages of the moon cycle across the work related in any way to smooth jazz. But Chell wasn't much of an artist anyway. It was then Chell's ears picked up a strange sound emitting from the radio. It was faint but to Chell it sounded like car alarms over squiggly popping noises. She carefully placed the radio down suddenly afraid it was going to blow up, or do-who-knows-what, on her.
Feeling slightly anxious at the weird sound, Chell left and hurled back to the switch. Before pressing it, the woman saw the annex where the super-button was waiting for a cube. It was too risky using a portal to access the place and come back. So Chell simply planted a blue portal above the super-button and then an orange right where the Weighted Cube would soar to when delivered by the Vital Apparatus Vent. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand. Perfect.
"Remember when I was talking before about smelly garbage standing around being useless? That was a metaphor. I was actually talking about you." Surprise, surprise. "And I'm sorry. You didn't react at the time, so I was worried it sailed right over your head." Ouch, so now GLaDOS was diminishing Chell's excursion to the office, not even acknowledging it as an act of defiance. "Which would have made this apology seem insane. That's why I had to call you garbage a second time just now." Thanks.
~o0o~
TEST 7 –07/22
VITAL APPARATUS VENT PRESENT
MIND THE APERTURE SCIENCE STORAGE CUBE
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
PREPARE TO JUMP FROM HIGH LEDGES
PREPARE TO PROPELL FROM HIGH LEDGES
AERIAL FAITH PLATE PRESENT
The question of food had arisen again like some gigantic beast from the depths of the ocean. Chell's stomach had not made a sound which, rather than ease her nerves, more frazzled them. If her body did not start demanding sustenance soon Chell was just going to assume Aperture Science had done something to her and immediately begin shouting. In the meantime… "Did you know that people with a guilty conscience are more easily startled by loud noises –?"
The suddenly blaring of a train's horn shook the elevator chamber, rattling the iron staircase. Admittedly, the sound had shocked her. In fact, Chell's feet had almost dislodged themselves from the boots. Goddammit.
"I'm sorry. I don't know why that went off," if GLaDOS had human shoulders she would have shrugged but her perfect timing was enough and did not require the use of pathetic human muscles whose only real value was in the search for scientific knowledge. "Anyway, just an interesting science fact." Brought to you by the pathetic nature of human muscle.
Chell rubbed her temples, seriously irritated with that sudden disruption. I mean, goddammit, she had just murdered the psychotic robot. Nothing terrible or offensive by any means. Chell swung the portal gun, noting how smooth the device still was after all this time, and proceeded to the main chamber. She jumped over a Discouragement Beam to meet a cube. Chell was this close to believing she had gone colour blind when she saw the pink blush of the cube meaning only one thing: a companion cube. But this couldn't be the same one. So it wasn't that special.
Regardless, Chell used her portal to pick up the cube. Immediately, as though it had touched an Emancipation Grid, the companion cube dissolved into harmless specs (although, how harmless can something like specs be in a place like Aperture Science?). With Chell's mouth down in disbelief, the A.I. spoke up, "Oh. Did I accidentally fizzle that before you could complete the test? I'm sorry. Go ahead and grab another one."
Chell narrowly dodged another headache when a new companion cube dropped from the vent. With the cube safe in her portal's grasp, Chell attended to the test chamber. It looked fairly simple and was quite small in comparison to the previous tests so this shouldn't be too difficult. First, Chell would block the beam's path with the companion cube –
It dissolved again.
"Oh. No. Fizzled that one too."
Chell nudged the next companion cube with her boot. It stayed put. She dribbled the cube over to the beam. It stayed put…good. "Oh well. We have a warehouse FULL of the things. Absolutely worthless. I'm happy to get rid of them."
The psychotic robot received a surprise herself when the human gasped. Despite using the cameras to look to where the human had, GLaDOS saw nothing. How funny. The human was already going mad. Turns out, Chell had responded to a small round blue-eyed robot peeking out from behind the walls before huddling back in again. Chell decided right there and then: she was going mad. Seeing things that weren't really there.
With the beam blocked by the cube, a platform moved to the bottom level. Chell stood on it, moved the cube with portals, dragging the platform up again. After propelling up multiple levels with the trusty aid of the companion cube and a super-button Chell made it to the exit. When Chell landed in the elevator something spiked her interest. And GLaDOS answered just on time: "Every test chamber is equipped with an emancipation grill at its exit, so that the test subjects can't smuggle test subjects out of the test area. This one is broken."
So it is.
Chell couldn't help but smirk.
"Don't take anything with you," GLaDOS muttered darkly.
This was too good to be true. Chell applied a blue portal in a corridor between the exit and the elevator, came back to the chamber, snatched the companion cube and swept through the orange portal. Just as Chell stepped into the elevator the companion cube died away.
"I think that one was about to say 'I love you.' They ARE sentient of course. We just have A LOT of them."
Sentient?
Nonononononononononono –
~o0o~
TEST 8 –08/22
VITAL APPARATUS VENT PRESENT
MIND THE APERTURE SCIENCE STORAGE CUBE
MIND THE THERMAL DISCOURAGEMENT BEAM
DISCOURAGEMENT REDIRECTION CUBE PRESENT
Pushing the companion cube to the far far corners of her mind, Chell ascended the staircase.
"This next test has emancipation grills. Remember? I told you about them in the last test area that did not have one."
The emancipation grid split the chamber into two which caused a real problem when a piping hot beam was on one side and its receptacle on the other. Chell climbed up into the side past the smoky blue grid. A switch also occupied the room. Chell's balance was altered when the area trembled. Lights blinked erratically. Chell frowned in confusion. "Ohhh, no. The turbines again. I have to go."
Yes!
"Wait –"
Nooo
"This next test DOES require some explanation. Let me give you the fast version." Chell rolled her eyes when a sped-up explanation was delivered, too fast for any ear to understand. That robot was just so damn funny. "There. If you have any questions, just remember what I said in slow motion. Test your own recognisance, I'll be right back."
Chell had already figured it out. She didn't need some explanation. On the right side of the grid there was a glass section complete with a hole. Chell was able to send an orange portal through. Then she pressed the switch and applied a blue portal and transported to the other side of the chamber. A redirection cube tumbled onto the ground. With the cube, Chell moved back through the portal. She used the cube to angle the beam to the receptacle, since the grid had no effect. Done!
And to top it all off, there was no frustrating robot making comment. No depressing thoughts there.
~o0o~
And that was Chapter 2 of Portal 2. Chapter 3: the Return will be up next.
To answer a few questions: yes Chell does know Italian. I know it seems random but it does have a purpose...
And yeah, sorry if this bored the hell out of you. Review if you wish. I don't mind regardless. It's nice knowing people are even looking at this. Thank you!